The present invention provides a sway control adaptor for mounting one end of a sway control assembly to a towing vehicle adjacent the trailer hitch, and in particular to such an adaptor which can be readily mounted to an existing trailer hitch.
The problem of excessive sway of a trailer with respect to the towing vehicle has long been recognized as a safety hazard when trailers are being towed, especially around curves and in the presence of high wind. Sway control assemblies or dampers, consisting basically of a linear friction slide interconnecting the towing vehicle and the trailer, have been recently developed and substantially minimize the problem of excessive trailer swaying when the control assembly is installed. Such devices usually have female hitch members at each end adapted to attach to complementary hitch balls on the trailer and the towing vehicle respectively. The sway control hitch ball on the towing vehicle is located to one side of the trailer hitch and the sway control hitch ball on the trailer is located alongside the trailer tongue and the sway control device extends between the two hitch balls.
The usual practice in mounting the sway control hitch ball to the towing vehicle is to weld a bar to the existing trailer hitch so that it extends transversely from the hitch, and to mount the sway control hitch ball to the free end of the transverse bar. This type of mounting assembly is adequate when a new trailer hitch incorporating the sway control hitch ball is constructed, but is relatively difficult to install for trailer hitches already mounted on a vehicle. Furthermore, the transverse bar presents an obstruction at the rear end of the towing vehicle which may be undesirable when the vehicle is used without a trailer. As a result, sway control assemblies are often not used even though their advantages in controlling the sway of the trailer are well known, and a trailer can be towed much more safely when a sway control assembly is installed.